Stars
by NekoNekoMinako
Summary: songfic, Aerrow tribute: Aerrow had always loved looking at the stars...


MJ: Just a little tribute to Aerrow that I felt like doing. Enjoy!!

Disclaimer: I don't own Storm Hawks.

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For as long as he could remember, Aerrow had always loved going outside and looking up at the stars. He never questioned why he did this, he just did. Whenever he was out and just looking up at the night sky, he felt at ease, as if nothing bad could ever happen in this tranquil time.

_Maybe I've been the problem, maybe I'm the one to blame_

_But even when I turn it off and blame myself, the outcome feels the same_

_I've been thinkin maybe I've been partly cloudy, maybe I'm the chance of rain_

_Maybe I'm overcast, and maybe all my lucks washed down the drain_

When he was only five, he always wondered one thing - who put the stars in the sky each night? How'd they know which one went where? The sky looked like it had huge strings of Christmas lights hanging in it, twinkling like the ones his dad put on the tree every year around that wondrous holiday.

There were times, he remembered, that his dad would join him. It was normally when he didn't have anything else to do, or wasn't too tired from his duties as a Sky Knight. His dad would point out different constellations to him - his favorite was always Aquila, his father's was Vulpecula. Aerrow had asked his dad one time why that was his favorite one, and his father told him that Vulpecula meant "little fox," which reminded him of Aerrow himself - a trickster who could find the fun in anything at all. His father also told him that was how he made it through the longer times of not being able to come home to see him.

_I've been thinking 'bout everyone, everyone you look so lonely_

After his father's death (later on to be found out it was by one of his dad's squadron members), Aerrow found the stars comforted him. He found himself looking at all the patterns his father pointed out to him during the times they would just lay in the backyard and stare at the sky. There were some he could never find, but they'd show up later when others did not.

_But when I look at the stars,_

_When I look at the stars,_

_When I look at the stars I see someone else_

_When I look at the stars,_

_The stars, I feel like myself_

Later on in life, during his years at the Sky Knight Academy, he could find himself at home again just by looking out at the starry night skies. He would admit that he was changing - growing up, if you will - but he knew he would never change one thing, and that was his love for those twinkling lights that graced the inky black of night.

_Stars lookin at our planet watching entropy and pain_

_And maybe start to wonder how the chaos in our lives could pass as sane_

_I've been thinking bout the meaning of resistance, of a hope beyond my own_

_And suddenly the infinite and penitent begin to look like home_

There were times, he remembered, when he actually felt he couldn't go on with the way things were going, that looking out at the stars, which held so many memories for him, gave him the strength and the courage to continue. Sometimes, he wondered, he thought he could actually see his father among the stars, but if he blinked, the image would be gone. He merely thought it was just an illusion, a hallucination, but deep down he wondered how true that really was.

_I've been thinking bout everyone, everyone you look so empty_

His friends always asked him what he saw in the stars, why he always seemed so happy when he saw them. Each and every time, he'd just shrug and say he didn't know. In reality, he knew why, but that was a secret he never wanted anyone to know. It was the precious memories of just him and his dad, their reality where there was no Cyclonia or wars. Just them and the starry sky above, nothing else.

_But when I look at the stars,_

_When I look at the stars,_

_When I look at the stars I see someone else_

_When I look at the stars,_

_The stars, I feel like myself_

Eventually, his squad stopped asking why he'd go out to the top of the Condor just to see the stars when he could see them just as easily through the window. He never gave them an answer anyway, so what was the point of asking? It was just something he did, and to be honest, it was when he actually looked to be his age - he didn't act like the mature teen he normally was, but showed that deep down, he was still just another fourteen year old boy. This was the time when being a Sky Knight didn't matter to him, when he could feel at ease, feel like there was still something left out there to fight for.

_Everyone, everyone we feel so lonely_

_Everyone, yeah everyone we feel so empty_

Sighing as his leaf-green eyes reflected the light from those twinkling stars, he let his head fall back, resting it on his arms as he lay down, one knee bent while the other leg stretched out lazily. Again, he saw his dad's face among them, and again when he blinked, it was gone, but this time, he saw where the image appeared - right over Vulpecula, the Little Fox. He smiled softly as he stared at the constellation, letting the memories of the times spent with his father out in the backyard, laying in the grass, just looking at the sky like this. Seeing the constellation his father said reminded him of his son, he felt that his father never really left him - he was just among the very things that kept them together as father and son, despite the many miles that came between them most of the time. No matter where he was, Aerrow was home.

_When I look at the stars,_

_when I look at the stars,_

_when I look at the stars I feel like myself_

_When I look at the stars, the stars_

_I see someone..._

_-- -- _

MJ: What think? Tell me if you like it or not! The song is "Stars" by Switchfoot.


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